Disclaimer: I do not own the characters which I have borrowed from MI High. I've moved the characters on to explore their new lives with Edward Dixon-Halliday.

"I think he's in shock," said Aggie. "It's delayed from the accident." Simon nodded in agreement. Aggie looked at Edward and saw the worry on his face. "Don't worry Edward. I'll look after him for a couple of days. Come round and visit. He'll be fine."

Oscar spent a couple of days at home doing nothing. The first day was easy. He slept, ate and watched a film. The second day was harder because he was starting to feel better. Aggie caught him reading a language book for one of the new languages he'd been asked to learn and gave him a proper telling off. Oscar thought that she could give Mrs King a run for her money in the scary stakes. He didn't try to sneak in any work after that.

Finally he was allowed to return to work with Rose at HQ. Rose had found a combination of coding algorithms which seemed to break open the code, but hadn't managed to work out the content. After a little work they worked out how to find the original text hidden within another coding system. "Someone really didn't want us to read this information," said Rose. "It's got to be good !" she said, bouncing up and down in anticipation. Oscar was amused. He'd hardly ever seen her so excited. They ran their last filter over the text and looked at the result. "Oh !" said Rose, disappointed. It still didn't make any sense.

"Wait a minute," said Oscar. "I think I know what the problem is," he added. He applied another instruction and the text on the screen changed into a series of strange characters. Just then, Carrie came into the lab where they were working.

"Hi guys, have you found anything ?" she asked.

"Yep !" said Oscar triumphantly, pointing at the screen.

Carrie looked at it. "What is that ?" she asked, completely baffled.

"It's Cyrillic text," said Oscar, as if this was the most obvious thing in the world.

"OK," said Carrie slowly. "And ?"

"It's used to write in Russian," explained Rose.

"Actually, it's used to write quite a lot of languages," said Oscar. "It's used across Eastern Europe, north Asia and its used for some Eskimo languages too."

Rose looked interested. "Really ? I didn't know that. I thought it was just Russian."

"A lot of people think that. I did, until I learned Russian and Bulgarian," said Oscar. "It makes the sounds that those languages need. Roman text doesn't really work as well."

"OK. So what language is that ?" asked Carrie.

"Oh, sorry. It is Russian. Fortunately, I know Russian. If it was Kyrghyz or something like that, we'd have to get in some help," said Oscar, smiling.

"Kir.. what ?" asked Carrie.

"Never mind. It doesn't matter," said Oscar. Just then his phone rang. "Yes. Oh hi Dad," said Oscar checking his watch. "Yes, I haven't forgotten. It's just that we've got into the data stream and I can translate some of it now.. yes.. OK.. OK, we'll go for a break now. OK Dad, I'm going !" Oscar hung up with an exasperated huff. "Dad says I need to take a break now. No arguing," he explained.

"Suits me," said Carrie. "I've been kicking the stuffing out of a punchbag all morning. That code isn't going anywhere is it ? Come and have a break and then come back to it." She looked meaningfully at Rose.

"Oh, yes, I'm ready for a break myself too," said Rose, rather less convincingly. Oscar smiled at them both.

"Come on. Let's get a coffee," he said, laughing. "I know when I'm outnumbered."

Oscar was doubly amused when Edward joined them in the lounge area. "Are you checking up on me Dad ?" he asked.

"Yes," said Edward. "Also, I need to update you with some intelligence that's come in. Our agents in the Mediterranean region are all saying that something is being planned, but they don't know where specifically. Some small criminal organisations around the Mediterranean seem to be involved in activities which they don't normally deal in. Our central intelligence team think they might be involved in a small way with the super-criminal organisation involved with SKUL. What language was the text you've managed to decode ?"

"Russian," said Oscar.

"Oh," said Edward, looking puzzled. "Well that doesn't seem to fit. Never mind, it might be another part of the puzzle. Keep at it. I'll see you later," he said, getting up to leave. He checked his watch. "Another half hour off for you Oscar," he said, tapping his watch.

"I promise," said Oscar, rolling his eyes as his Dad left the room. He was prepared to wait. Like Carrie had said, the code wasn't going to go anywhere while they were sitting here.

Carrie excused herself because she had some special weapons training to attend. Rose sat with Oscar for the rest of him imposed break and then they returned together to the data. Oscar sat working through the translation of the data they had decrypted while Rose attempted to break into some more of the information. She succeeded and this time Oscar identified it as Italian.

"That sounds more like what your Dad was interested in," suggested Rose.

"Could be. Could all be part of the same thing," said Oscar. "It's funny Italian though. I think it's a dialect of some kind. Wait a sec, while I make a phone call." Oscar got out his mobile and hunted through the contacts list, then made a call. "Ciao Guiseppe !" Oscar rattled on in Italian for some time. Rose couldn't follow the conversation. Oscar seemed to be relating some of the text they had found to the person on the other end of the line and taking notes from what they said. "Bene. Bene. Arrivederci et grazie !" said Oscar finally hanging up.

"OK. It's Sicilian," said Oscar. "Have you got any more ?" he asked.

"No, that's the last of it," said Rose, pointing to the end of the text that was on Oscar's screen. "We've run out of data now," she added.

"Well, that's the last of my translation," said Oscar, typing in the last few words, with some annotations. "The bulk of what we found is in Russian, and as far as I can see it's a communication to an arms dealer based in Sicily, or who has a communications point in Sicily anyway. It sounds like the Russians have some arms stolen from official sources and they are offering to supply them to the group based in Sicily," he said.

"That would tie in with your Dad's intel about something happening in the Mediterranean area," said Rose. "It could be where the arms smuggling ring is based."

"Could be," agreed Oscar. He attached the original file decrypted by Rose and himself and the translation and attached them in an email to his Dad. "I think I'm done for the day. I'm tired," he admitted.

"This could be our first lead Oscar," said Rose excited. "I want to get them back for what they did to us."

"Me too," said Oscar. "If there's going to be a mission, I want to be on it but I can't even get through a whole day sitting down in front of a computer yet. I'm a liability," he said despondently, rubbing his face with his hands.

"Well, we will just have to see," said Rose, rubbing his shoulder sympathetically.